Imaging characteristics and embolus burden of unreported pulmonary embolism in oncologic patients

The present study sought to estimate the frequency of overseen and unreported (i.e., false negative) pulmonary embolism (PE) events in oncologic patients. In a retrospective analysis, 3270 patients (6780 computed tomography examinations) were reviewed. Unreported PE was found in 74 patients (2.3%). It was particularly frequent in follow-up staging examinations in patients with metastasized malignancies of the lung and kidney. The present data support the thesis that the search error (thrombus was never fixed by the eyes of the reviewer) was the most common reason why PE was overseen.